


Stolen Destiny

by KingHorseHead



Category: RWBY
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Grief/Mourning, canon divergence - volume 3 episode 12
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-03-17
Updated: 2021-03-17
Packaged: 2021-03-26 04:14:42
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,097
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30100155
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KingHorseHead/pseuds/KingHorseHead
Summary: Pyrrha Nikos believed in destiny. Everyone's fates were written, even if one did not know what that was. Pyrrha thought she knew, but the last person she wanted involved was the one who took her fate. Ozpin is gone, and Beacon Tower is now the resting place of a frozen dragon and a dear friend. Pyrrha knows she has to help her friend Ruby Rose travel the world and spread word about the truth of the Fall of Beacon, but can she do it with a guilty conscience?
Relationships: Jaune Arc/Pyrrha Nikos
Kudos: 4





	Stolen Destiny

Two figures stumbled out of the crumbling tower that lay behind them. The centerpiece of the academy, Beacon Tower, was not falling apart. Broken and battered were the stones that reached into the heavens above, being guarded by a ferocious winged beast and a lone woman who took control of one of the very elements of life.

The first of the two, his breathing heavy and labored beneath his sterling armor, took the chance to stop as soon as they has escaped. His hands went to his knees, the young man remembering what training he had to try and attempt to control his breathing. 

Jaune Arc pushed the blonde hair out of his face as he struggled to make sense of everything that had happened in the past day. As a hero to be, he needed to remain strong. Everything he had learned to become a huntsman was being put to the test, but at the very least he was next to the one person he could count on the most.

Pyrrha Nikos, though a bit smaller than the tall and lanky Jaune, seemed to be digesting the stress much better than he. A renowned champion and even a celebrity of sorts, Pyrrha was used to constant stressors, even if this was unlike anything she had ever faced before.

Their plan was simple. Escape the lower levels of the tower and reach out for help. Their headmaster was fighting alone against a force they could barely understand. They were only children. Even though they had been training for almost a year now to become premiere combatants and adventurers, this was in a league that might have been above even the most seasoned of huntsmen.

“Okay, I think I have Glynda’s number,” Said Jaune, as he scrambled for his scroll. He tapped impatiently at the translucent screen, trying oh so desperately to find the number that they needed.

He might have found the number too if it weren’t for a deep rumbling that shook the earth beneath their feet. Pyrrha turned back to the tower while Jaune continued to search for the number.

“Pyrrha?” Jaune turned only briefly to his friend, “What was all of that?”

She couldn’t find the right words to answer him, not with the level of danger that surrounded them. Without options, the turned away. She would never lie to him or deny him the truth, but there was no easy way to explain what she was about to do. “I…”

The earth shook once more, interrupting Pyrrha. The violent tremors were becoming more and more frequent as the moments passed onwards. Together, they looked at the tower just in time to see a massive ball of fire rise all the way from the base up to the top of the tower. They both knew that the office of their headmaster, Professor Ozpin, was up there.

They looked on in horror. A sight that shouldn’t have been was happening before their eyes, and putting dark thoughts into their heads. Ozpin should have been able to handle the mysterious woman even with the fabled powers of the Fall Maiden. After all, no one knew about the power better than Ozpin himself. If he was smart enough to figure out a way to transfer it from the previous bearer of the Maiden title into Pyrrha, then he must have known a way to beat it.

“But… But Ozpin…” Jaune did not want to accept the fact that the fiery explosion meant the death of their headmaster, but the other options were looking quite impossible given the evidence they had. He refused to give up hope. There had to be another way.

He took a single step forward, an arm catching his and pulling him back before he could take another step.

Pyrrha shook her head at Jaune, tears filling her eyes as she stared up at him.

“There’s no time,” She said to him, her voice horse. A small clearing of her throat and a shake of the head hardened her features. “Go! Get to Vale and call for help.” Jaune was the leader of the team, they both knew this, but Pyrrha knew that she had to take the initiative in order to stop this chaos from spiraling further.

He took a sharp breath as he backtracked from Pyrrha’s firm pull on his arm. “Huh? What are you going to do?”

She offered no words to him. Pyrrha turned up to the tower where the dragon rested at the top. Ozpin’s assailant was up there. She had to stop him.

“No. No, Pyrrha, you can’t. You saw how powerful she is!” The young man blocked her path forward. “Pyrrha, I won’t let you do-“

She silenced him with a firm and powerful kiss, pulling him close and pouring every ounce of love she had into it. She knew this would be the first time and the last time. If she never saw him again, she wanted to make her feelings undoubtedly clear for her socially oblivious leader. All of the weight off of her shoulders had been lifted right then and there. A new sense of freedom surrounded her as she felt more powerful than before. Believing that her affirmation to her devotion to him would strengthen her in this upcoming fight.

His shock melted away quickly. In that brief moment, he knew. Everything made sense. Her friendship, her loyalty, her pain, anger, and confusion. The noise of battle faded away, and in the silence that followed the parting of their lips, Pyrrha also came to her own fearful realization.

“I’m sorry.”

He had beaten her to the punch.

It was a move that he had learned from another teammate of theirs, Lie Ren. His hands pushed at her hips, followed by a sturdy push on her breastplate. While Jaune normally wasn’t all that strong physically, his astonishing Aura more than made up for it when he channeled the essence of his soul into his hands for a little extra power. On his arm was now her shield, and in his hand her rifle.

She gasped in surprise as her feet skidded across the stone pathway the two stood on. She knew that he was never all that keen into exploring his aura and semblance. To see him use such a technique at all was a shock to her. More than that, that he was able to push her back more than enough to take her off her feet, forcing her to recover mid-air.

This gave Jaune the chance that he needed. Racing to one of the nearby rocket lockers, Jaune punched in a set of numbers into it. Anyone could access these lockers. Jaune already had experience in riding in one before.

“Wait! Stop, stop!” Pyrrha pleaded in the distance, trying to run after him to stop him. She refused to use her semblance out of harming another again. She knew she couldn’t get him in time. “Jaune, please don’t do this!” Tears stung her eyes, but that would not stop Jaune from his new, self appointed mission.

With a final slam on the keypad, Jaune shut himself in the locker. The thrusters at the bottom burst with power, firing him high into the air in mere seconds. His aim was true. Jaune was dead-set for the top of the tower.

Pyrrha stood absolutely helpless on the ground. She knew the dangers of trying to manipulate the locker in any way. Weaponless and powerless, she watched as her heart ached and her legs trembled.

Oh how cruel fate was to those who believed they knew the future.

She watched the locker fly high and enter the tower. Her heart sank as her mind began to fill with all of the horrible things that woman could to do Jaune. She couldn’t help. But she had to do something.

Her shaking hands searched for her own scroll. Someone had to be able to help. Any of the staff, her teammates or friends. Anybody.

It took time, but Pyrrha was eventually able to get a call out. The dialing done droned on in what seemed like lifetimes before finally it was answered by the last person she had wanted to call regarding Jaune.

“Where are you?” Was the first thing Pyrrha heard from the other end. None other than Weiss Schnee answered the call, the object of Jaune’s affections over the past two semesters at Beacon.

The invincible woman was brought down lower than she ever thought possible. It took every ounce of strength left to explain parts of the situation in what time they had. Pyrrha needed someone to get Jaune.

“Weiss! Please, you have to stop him!” She needed to hold back her tears for just a moment. She couldn’t let a single word be mistaken.

“What-“ Weiss attempted to reply, but Pyrrha cut her off in a continuation of what she was saying.

“It’s Jaune!” Her voice raised. She needed to remind herself that Weiss couldn’t read minds, and had no idea what was happening on their end of things. “He… He’s going after that woman, at the top of the tower! He doesn’t stand a chance against her!” Pyrrha knew that Weiss didn’t have all the answers right now, but she knew that they both had to agree that Jaune was simply not ready for something like this.

“Pyrrha, what are you talking about? Where are you?”

Pyrrha could only restrain herself for so long before she lashed out at Weiss over the call.

“Don’t worry about me!” She screamed in desperation. She knew that she could do little in the moment when it came to helping Jaune. Jaune might have been equipped with weaponry now, her weaponry, but despite all of the faith she had in Jaune she knew that he had no idea how to use it effectively.

“Please…” Her words were strained, her hands gripping at her scroll as tight as she could. “You have to save Jaune.

The next reply from Weiss was much faster this time. Barely a beat passed before a response came through.

“We will. Are you okay?”

Was she okay? Did Weiss not hear her. They needed to ignore her own wellbeing right now. Pyrrha was a famous scholar and huntress in training. She had suffered dire injuries and failures before and come back from them stronger than ever. She was, for better or worse, a survivor.

However, Jaune was not like her.

Jaune came to Beacon Academy with fake transcripts and heirloom weapons that belonged to his ancestors in wars long past. Jaune might have been handy with a shield, but he wouldn’t be used to fighting with her spear that doubled as a rifle. His simple sword and shield technique was unique to him. It may have been a bit silly and even a bit barbaric compared to other highly advanced weapons of the modern age, but it was so him.

He was fighting without a single advantage. Jaune had a strong heart and a fierce sense of right, but the woman’s skill and power would break him without a second thought. No matter how hard Jaune chose to try and fight, it would only end fatally.

His mission was suicide.

Her angst, rage, and sorrow had finally reached it’s peak. Pyrrha screamed to the heavens and threw her scroll into the ground. Of course only now would her semblance work properly, making a small crater in the ground with small remnants of her scroll in the center.

She fell to her knees, the sadness quickly replacing the rage she had just expelled. Jaune was the one person that she vowed to protect, to train, to see become a wonderful huntsman who could turn his idyllic dreams into reality. The one boy in all of Vale and Beacon who had no idea what her name was. The only reason he could recall her was because she once appeared on the front of a cereal box a year or two ago. His simplicity and honest desire to do good were what inspired her to keep his lie and to help him be the person he wanted to be.

She failed him.

As she sobbed openly, tears fell freely and streamed across her face. Pyrrha cried loud and hard, despair setting in. In mere hours, she had killed one, and let another march off to his ultimate fate.

Nobody was around, but there was little else she could do. Meekly, she begged for help from any person or power that would hear her prayers.

“Please…"


End file.
